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Egypt faces a reckoning over its strongman ways

Egypt's crackdown on dissent has reached a zenith — or a nadir. But will it wreck the economy?

Egyptian special forces are becoming a prominent part of the cityscape. Here they patrol the streets to prevent potential anti-government protests on the fifth anniversary of the uprising that toppled Hosni Mubarak.
(MAHMOUD KHALED / AFP/GETTY IMAGES)

When a would-be hijacker forced an Egyptian plane to land in Cyprus last week and initially demanded release of female political prisoners, the world held its breath.

Then the brief standoff ended peacefully, the motive was declared a personal issue and the spotlight on Egypt switched off.

For thousands of political prisoners there was no relief.

After more than two years of deepening repression, the regime of President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi has locked up at least 40,000, many of them tortured in detention.

Journalists have been arrested for reporting on the actions of the security forces, and suspected dissidents have disappeared.

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Egypt has also cracked down on non-governmental organizations that defend human rights, launching criminal investigations on those receiving foreign funds, freezing their assets and imposing travel bans to stop them leaving the country.

Since autocrat Hosni Mubarak was deposed in 2011, “things have got much, much worse,” says Mohammad Fadel, a law professor at University of Toronto. “There is no comparison now. The regime thinks there was too much space for dissent, and the only way to end it is to stop all dissent.”

The crackdown began in July 2013, when massive anti-government protests led to the ouster of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi in a military-backed coup.

The Sissi regime “started with the Muslim Brotherhood, then went after other organizations that opposed it,” says Sahar Aziz, an associate professor of law at Texas A&M University. “It’s part of a cycle that existed under Mubarak. But the sweep of the crackdown on NGOs is much broader now.”

That has prompted Egypt’s Western allies to ask where this growing authoritarianism is leading, and what, if anything, the international community could do to halt it.

When Sissi took power, he insisted that Egypt was in transition to democracy. But U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry — representing one of Cairo’s chief supporters — last week warned that the human rights situation was deteriorating against a “wider backdrop of arrests and intimidation of political opposition, journalists, civil society activists and cultural figures.”

Italy is outraged over the torture and murder of Giulio Regeni, an Italian graduate student who was researching the Egyptian labour movement. Egypt has blamed “criminal gangs” for his killing.

Ireland and the European Parliament have protested the almost three-year detention of an Irish student charged with murder in a mass trial that has been postponed 13 times.

Meanwhile ailing Canadian resident Khaled Al Qazzaz is trapped in Cairo under a travel ban, with his Canadian-born wife and four children, after being released from an 18-month detention without charge.

Experts say that Egypt resists international pressure on human rights because it is battling Islamic militants in the Sinai Peninsula who have killed hundreds of its security forces. The most populous country in the region, it also plays on fears of Daesh terrorism and instability that could tip the already unstable Middle East into chaos.

“Sissi isn’t subject to arm-twisting,” says Adel Iskandar of Simon Fraser University, author of Egypt in Flux. “He’s able to play the game internationally. He argues that Egypt has a large population, very high illiteracy rate and very conservative society. He makes the case for strong, iron-fisted government so if things go awry, no one has the ability to stand up to him.”

He adds, “the Sissi government is doing what it was built to do. He came out of military intelligence. His government is a coercive organization that collects data on everyone. He’s ill-equipped to handle the economy, culture or religion. But if security is the problem, he’s the right man.”

Egypt’s human rights problems are deep and systemic. The justice system is “opaque,” says Aziz, with “unspoken rules” that judges follow to stay in favour with the regime, even though officials aren’t dictating the verdicts.

“To show loyalty — and get fringe benefits — they might be tough on terror and national security, even in violation of procedural law, though cases often get reversed on appeal. The objective isn’t to target an individual case, but to stop the public from being politically active or dissenting against the regime.”

But the basic problem, says Fadel, “is the people in charge. It isn’t just Sissi. He’s the figurehead of a coalition of influence peddlers and power holders. They think there has been too much politics, and people should mind their own business and stay home.”

Egypt’s rulers have helped to polarize the society, which has fractured badly after the brief unity of Tahrir Square.

“There are massive rifts,” says Iskandar. “There are Islamists vs. liberal secularists. But the majority are middle-of-the-road Egyptians. They’re political couch potatoes: even though the state has failed to deliver anything to them, they still believe in preserving the structure of the state.”

But, he adds, the hope for democracy is not dead, in spite of the apathy and draconian crackdowns. Cartoonists and social media users are refusing to be silent. Cracks are even appearing among supporters of the regime.

This week, a front-page article in a government-allied newspaper pointed a finger at the impunity of Egypt’s police services in Regeni’s murder. Western countries are issuing travel warnings, damaging the already depressed tourist trade.

The fallout is making some of Sissi’s supporters uneasy, Iskandar says. “They aren’t prepared to undermine the system of governance. But he owes them for entrenching him as a hero. Now they’re saying ‘you have to make this work.’”

EGYPT CHUNKY NUMBERS

40,000

Political prisoners in Egypt

1,250

Forced disappearances in 2015

588

People sentenced to death in 2014 and 2015

973

Days that Irish student Ibrahim Halawa has been held without trial on widely decried murder charges as of April 6

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